Before Wild Beer was founded, Andrew and Brett were at the Great British Beer Festival contemplating British Beer
We tried a beer called La Roja by Jolly Pumpkin brewery and Brett immediately commented that it was a shame no breweries in the UK made beers like that.
One week after our return from the Great British Beer Festival, Andrew gave Brett a bottle of Gales Prize Old Ale to try, and an idea for a beer of our own was born.
The idea was to brew a dark beer that is barrel-aged with wild yeasts. What followed was a series of conversations that led to us to thinking about brewing lots of beers that were barrel-aged and used wild yeasts the Wild Beer Co. seeds had been sown.
The first batch of Modus Operandi, the beer that came from that first idea, was brewed at Arbor Ales in June 2012. Four months later, brewing began at Wild Beer HQ.
As a beer that requires ageing and maturation, the brettanomyces yeast that create Modus Operandi are slow burners. At first it was aged in bourbon casks, but we soon realised they didn’t quite give the complexity and layers of flavour we desired. As a result we decided to age in both red wine and bourbon casks and then blend the two together. It created a far deeper fruity beer, with further layers of flavour that took it to another level.
As we grew our barrel cellar we were able to include barrels with younger or older Modus in them, and also see how second use barrels work. We can’t wait to see how the Modus develops and look forward to holding some vertical tastings in years to come with a number of aged bottles.
